After ISIS Collapse, Serbian Women Trapped in Syria

BIRN agreed not to reveal the identity of the family for security reasons.

"We are a normal family, like any other," the mother told BIRN, saying her daughter had left in December 2014.

"We addressed the local authorities [in Novi Pazar] but they all remain silent."

The 20 Serbian women are among hundreds of other Muslims from the Balkan region who have found themselves trapped since the Islamic State's demise, many wishing to return but struggling to get the support they need to do so from their home states.

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An unidentified woman, reportedly a wife of a suspected Islamic State (IS) fighter, walks at Roj refugees camp in Hasakah, northeast of Syria, 24 February 2019. Photo: EPA-EFE/MURTAJA LATEEF

With US support, Kosovo on Friday facilitated the return of 110 of its citizens from Syria, mainly family members of Islamic State fighters. Four were immediately arrested on suspicion of terrorism, while Kosovo Kosovo authorities have begun interviewing several women from the group under suspicion of being part of terrorist groups fighting in Syria.

A 24-year-old Bosnian citizen was also sent back to his home country from Syria in a separate deportation on March 20. He has been charged with organising a terrorist group, the illegal establishment of and association with foreign paramilitary or para-police formations, and terrorism, the Bosnian prosecution announced.

BIRN this month also identified at least 85 children born to ethnic Albanian women from Albania, Kosovo and North Macedonia under the Islamic State, now stuck in a Kurdish-run camp in Syria. Their families in the Balkans are pleading with authorities for their safe return.  

BIRN has tried unsuccessfully for...